Genuinely frightening

Rating: 8/10 (25 April 2004)

Even if you're a cynical movie watcher, I challenge you to watch this movie in a dark room, suspend your disbelief, and not be frightened. I won't claim this is a perfect film. In fact, it seems as if either the creative forces behind the movie lost their edge at times or some Hollywood producers got their hands on it at some point. As a whole, however, 28 Days Later delivers the goods.
Once you can accept a disease consisting of pure rage is infecting humanity turning everyone into zombies, you're good to go. The most compelling part about the film is its characters. They are actually more than pieces of meat waiting for the next act of utter stupidity to lead them to slaughter. Their humanity in the face of oblivion is absolutely believable. This is not to say that they don't do things that put them in danger of getting shredded by zombies. But, more often than not, zombie encounters are an organic part of the plot, not contrivances to eliminate a character who has hit his or her expiration date.
Once the few central survivors have bonded over narrow escapes and nights spent huddled in fear, the movie switches gears and leads them to an encampment of soldiers with the weaponry and defenses necessary to fend off the zombies. At this point the film takes a totally different, but fascinating take on human nature as it pertains to impending zombie takeover. Of course, it wouldn't be any fun if the zombies didn't breach the sanctity of the makeshift army base. The film unfortunately ends in a way you'll have to see to disbelieve, though the DVD has deleted endings that you can easily replace the real one with in your mind.
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The important part here is that you'll be scared. I've had nightmares about this movie, so be forewarned if you're impressionable. I'm not normally entertained by horror movies. This is not your run of the mill zombie flic, though.